Blakesley
Blakesley walked down the halls towards Taylor and Christian's cell.
N999 trotted along behind him, arms full of computer read out.
"Respectfully sir, when can I go out on a mission?"
"Soon enough, N999."
"Of course, sir."
Blakesley unlocked the door by pressing the code into the buttonpad on the door and it opened slowly. N999 followed him and put the paper down on the table.
"Release Taylor from his constraints, N999."
"Yes sir."
N999 moved forward to do that.
Christian & Taylor
Christian watched curiously as Taylor's wrists were unlocked.
Taylor had already begun to shiver again, and as soon as his hands were free his legs collapsed, leaving him sitting on the floor.
With a groan, he managed to move his arms. They were almost completely stiff from being in the same position for so long.
Blakesley
N999 jerked him to his feet, before semi-guiding, semi-dragging him to where Blakesley was leafing through the pages.
"Sit down on the chair, Taylor."
Taylor
Taylor eyed the chair, before moving towards it and practically collapsing into it.
He wrapped his arms around his stomach and kept his eyes to the floor.
Blakesley
"Read this for me, please," Blakesley said, selecting a page of readout and placing it in front of Taylor.
"Convert it to English."
Christian & Taylor
Christian sighed and leant back against the wall again as Taylor glanced up at Blakesley.
Rubbing his arm a little, he leant forward slightly so he could see the numbers and letters forming the code.
"It has come to the attention of the armed forces of the United States of America..." he began softly, as if reading it in plain English, "that dangerous forces are working to destroy it from within. Like the terrorist forces from Iran and Iraq, but these have far more dangerous capabilities. Here, with the work of Bolivar Trask, we are attempting to address two simeltaneous problems. The Alien and the Mutant problems."
He read a little more - Christian listening intently - before reaching out to push the paper away.
"I shouldn't read that," he said softly, shaking his head.
Blakesley
"Why not? An interesting look into the mind of your enemy," Blakesley said.
"It goes on to detail some of the solutions to both problems."
Taylor & Christian
Taylor put his right hand up.
"I don't need to know..." he began slowly, "and I don't want to know."
"Speak for yourself," Christian muttered.
Blakesley
"A pity you did not receive your original's power, Christian," Blakesley said as he picked up the pages and flipped through them.
"Then you could understand these."
Christian & Taylor
"Way to state the obvious," Christian rolled his eyes.
Taylor wrapped his arms around his stomach again - careful of the needle still there - and took a deep breath.
Blakesley
"Sir, do you have further need of me? I have been requested to go help contain one of the Hostiles," N999 said.
"Restrain Taylor again, and you can go," Blakesley said.
N999 nodded, and then tugged Taylor up out of his chair.
Christian & Taylor
Taylor gulped slightly and let her restrain him again. The chair was nice while it lasted.
Christian was quite obviously checking out N999's rear as she did this.
Once the cuffs were on, Taylor once again hung from his wrists.
Blakesley
N99 turned around again, raising an eyebrow at Christian once she'd finished securing Taylor again.
"Enjoy the view while it lasts. You'll probably be blindfolded by the next time I come in. Will that be all, sir?"
"That will be all. You can go now, N999."
She turned and left through the door.
Christian & Taylor
"Don't bloody well need to be now, do I?" Christian muttered to himself, glancing up at the camera and leaving his gaze to the ceiling.
Taylor watched Blakesley's feet in case the doctor moved.
Blakesley
Blakesley smiled slightly.
"It is almost certain that you will give some excuse."
Christian
"And you'd just love that, wouldn't you?" Christian pointed out, looking straight at him.
"And your prissy little felines probably would too."
Blakesley
"Do I detect a hint of dislike for my soldiers?" Blakesley asked, raising an eyebrow.
Christian & Taylor
Taylor groaned.
"Oh no, of course not," Christian frowned with a perfect cross of sincerity and sarcasm.
He hesitated with a considering look on his face.
"Although they sure do look good," he raised his eyebrows.
Blakelsey
"An accident," Blakesley dismissed.
"Though, it does work in their favour as espionage agents."
Christian & Taylor
"Indeed," Christian couldn't help but half smile.
He chuckled to himself and leant his head back against the wall.
Taylor closed his eyes.
Blakesley
"Anyway, back to work..."
Blakesley picked out a scalpel and turned it slowly, keen blade flashing in the knife.
Christian & Taylor
Taylor's eyes shot open again.
He stood up properly again and twisted his wrists, his eyes on the blade.
Christian sobered and finally turned his attention back to Blakesley.
Blakesley
Something thudded against the door and Blakesley turned irritated eyes to it. The steel buckled.
"Oh, for god's sake..."
He went over and opened the door into a scene of chaos. About ten of the N series clones were attempting to control a large doglike demon that was covered in hard grey scales. Obdurate red eyes glared around balefully before it coughed and spat a blue liquid into the face of one of the girls. She screamed and dropped, clawing at her now bubbling skin.
Blakesley closed the door again.
"I told them not to capture Locksaw demons..."
Christian & Taylor
"I guess good help is still hard to find, is it Kaleb?" Christian almost smirked.
Taylor just sank down a little as if to pretend he wasn't there.
Blakesley
"No, this would be a very bad command descion. Commanding military personnel..."
Blakesley picked up the scalpel again, ignoring the door even when it bubbled faintly.
Christian & Taylor
Christian just shrugged.
Taylor's eyes fell on the door, and he gulped again slightly. He slowly began to inch away just in case.
Blakesley
"Military mind...hah! What military mind?"
Blakesley studied Christian's chest for a moment, before the scalpel flicked out to cut a graceful line arcing from near the bottom of his ribcage to the top.
Christian
Christian's upper lip twitched, but thaat was the main reaction. Blinking slowly and steadily, he remembered that start of his retraining.
He kept his eyes on Blakesley's as if silently challenging him.
Blakesley
"Ah!"
Blakesley stopped, and tapped the tip of the scalpel beneath Christian's eye.
"How interesting."
He then turned to study the same eye on Taylor.
"Minor physical differetation..."
Christian & Taylor
Christian raised his eyebrows.
"And this would be... what?"
Taylor dropped his head a little after Blakesley looked at his eye and held his breath.
Blakesley
"A brown spot in your eye that is absent in Taylor's."
Blakesley turned to the cupboard, hunting through it.
"Does the other the genetic material was taken from to create Christian have brown eyes?"
Christian & Taylor
Taylor's head came up again.
"Ike?"
"Isaac does, yeah," Christian said slowly, eyebrows lowered.
He'd never noticed it before. And no one had pointed it out to him.
And he sure as heck hadn't seen it in the mirror yet.
Blakesley
Blakesley picked out a ocular examing device and started to use it to examine Christian's eye.
"Fascinating.."
Christian & Taylor
Christian just gave in and stood there waiting as Taylor watched Blakesley curoiously.
"If there really is something brown there," Christian raised his eyebrows, "then it only just came up recently. I've never seen it before. Unless you're just seeing things."
Blakesley
"No, there's a definite difference in pigmentation of the iris..."
Blakesley snapped the mechanism up and out of the way, reaching for a pad to jot down his observations.
Christian & Taylor
"How could eyes just... go from blue to brown though?" Taylor frowned, talking quietly as usual.
Christian shrugged.
"Something must have kicked in somewhere," he concluded.
Blakesley
"It is only a speck..."
Blakesley settled to ignoring them, pen scratching over the paper as he wrote in an elegant cursive. Totally abosrbed in his work.
Christian & Taylor
"Well why that would be of any interest I have no idea," Christian shrugged.
Taylor closed his eyes and leant his head back against the wall again.
Christian sighed and just waited for Blakesley to finish whatever he was doing.
Blakesley
"Every thing is of interest to the scientific mind...I can hardly expect you two to understand that."
Blakesley stood, placing the notepad back inside his coat.
"Sir, they're about to test the first Sentinel operating system," N999 announced coming in through the door.
Her shoes were splashed with blood.
"Then by all means, let us observe."
Blakesley uncovered one half of a wall, revealing a large plasma screen. It flickered, then turned on to show what was obviously a camera view from above of a large room. Blakesley pressed another button and the sound turned on.
"S'il vois plait! Je desire ma maman! S'il vois plait!" (Please! I want my mother! Please!)
A girl of about thirteen ran around the room, beating at the glass with her fists, tears streaming down her face.
"S'il vous plait, je veux aller a cher maison!" (Please, I want to go home.)
"This is the mutant test subject, correct?" Blakesley said softly.
"Affirmative, Doctor."
"M'aidez!" (Help me!)
"We are just escorting the human subject inside now..."
"Quelqu'un, m'aidez, sil vous plait! Un dieu d'Oh! Je ne veux pas mourir!" (Someone, help me, please! Oh god! I don't want to die!)
Christian & Taylor
"Sentinel?" Christian raised his eyebrows with an interested look on his face.
Taylor gulped, keeping his eyes on the screen.
Blakesley
Blakesley watched as a teenaged boy was pushed into the room as well.
"Did we have an alien subject available?" he queried.
"Dr Trask is trying to hunt one up now."
"If I remember correctly, there was a subject that was acquired in Australia that might be useable..." Blakesley said.
"I'll tell him, sir."
"The f*ck is going on? What the f*ck? Pricks! Let me the f*ck out, you f*cking losers!" the teen yelled, glaring up at the camera.
He took off his shoe and threw it at the lens.
"F*cking kidnapping freaks!"
"Je veux aller à chez maison!" (I want to go home!)
"Mama, Mama, je veux ma mama!"
Christian & Taylor
Christian couldn't hold back a chuckle at the teen's reaction.
Taylor's eyes never left the screen, keeping his eye mainly on the girl.
Blakesley
An older woman was pushed into the room and she looked around with a sigh, before glancing upward at the camera. A healing knife scar ran down her face and down her throat, disappearing under the thick metal collar.
"What new devilry is this?"
"Je veux ma maman!"
"Children now? Oh, you humans..."
The woman went over to the sobbing girl and hugged her.
"Shh now, kiddo. Hopefully, this will be over soon."
"Je ne veux pas mourir..."
"Wish I could understand ya, I do, but I didn't study French."
"F*ckers!"
The boy picked up his shoe off the floor and threw it at the camera again.
"Making them angry doesn't change a thing," the older woman observed.
"F*ck them!"
"Are we ready to proceed with the experiment?" Blakesley inquired.
"We think so. Suject M-19764, first generation mutant with the power of creating small lights. No explosive capability so far detected. Subject A-164, normal human. No powers. Subject S-1957, Semirellian alien with the power of manipulating plant material in a minor fashion and the usual atom manipulation."
"We have names, you know," the woman observed.
"Mine's Grace Timms. What's yours, miss?"
"Je m'appelle Adeline. Adeline Delacour. M'aidez, s'il vous plait, madame! Je veux a chez maison!"
"And yours, guy?"
"What the f*ck does it matter? It's Scott."
"Nice to meet you, Scott."
"Are we ready to proceed with the test?"
"Affirmative."
Christian & Taylor
"She understands English but she can't speak it. Riiiight..." Christian nodded to himself, looking towards the door.
Taylor glanced at him, before his eyes worriedly returned tot he screen.
Blakesley
"Begin."
Blakesley watched with interest as a human sized, not quite finished robot walked through a door. Scott moved back, eyes grim and wary. Adeline screamed and ran to the back wall, cowering against it. Grace lifted an eyebrow slightly.
"Can we have visuals on the proto-Sentinel's thought processes?"
Another small screen flickered into existence, a small scope sight outlining what the robot was looking at. At the moment it was looking at Scott. Small lines of text ran down the side of the scope.
DNA scan complete. Human. Do not attack.
The view scanned onto Adeline.
DNA scan running...DNA scan complete. Activated X-Gene. Perform cleansing of gene pool. Immediate. Top force.
A laser beam arrowed into the girl's chest, throwing her backwards in a spray of gore.
"Oh, sweet merciful Christ!" Grace exclaimed, hand over her mouth as the girl slid to the floor.
Scott stared in shock.
Life continues. Repeat action.
Another laser beam hit Adeline in her head, which more or less exploded. Grace moved away slightly before a laser beam clipped her side.
"Ah!"
"F*ck!"
Scott scrambled away from the alien woman before the Sentinel followed up its attack relentlessly. Grace avoided the deadly blasts for as long as she could before one shot hit her knee and she fell to the floor. Another blast, and she was dead. Scott was standing against a wall, painted in splatters of blood and shaking with shock as the Sentinel stumped over to return through the door it had entered through.
"A successful test," Blakesley said, pleased.
Christian & Taylor
Christian raised an eyebrow as Taylor turned his head away, looking sick.
"Now that was cool," Christian approved.
Taylor gulped and steadied his breathing as he remembered Blakesley saying he might be used in the project.
Blakesley
"I am working with another scientist on this project for the United States military," Blakesley said.
"Sooner or later, a mutant will arouse the anti-mutant fervour to a high pitch. And then the Sentinels will already be there to be used."
Christian & Taylor
"Well why wait?" Christian looked confused.
"Why don't you just send them out as soon as they're ready? Well more than half the human population would probably vote them in."
Taylor cringed as another tear fell from his right eye.
Blakesley
"So eager to watch your own species be destroyed along with the mutants?" blakesley said.
"They should be ready soon...That was merely a prototype, but as you saw, highly effective."
Christian
"Well I am a hunter, so yeah," Christian nodded.
"You might want to work on the mess factor though. Otherwise you're going to have to create some other sequence of robots just to clean up after them. The humans may want aliens and mutants dead, but not if their kids have to witness blood and guts on the street."
Blakesley
"The finished Sentinels will be significantly larger," Blakesley said.
"The bodies will be incinerated."
Christian & Taylor
"Ah," Christian nodded.
"Sweet."
Taylor gulped again and wiped his eyes against his arm.
Blakesley
"It is almost certain that you will be involved in some later phase of testing," Blakesley said.
He looked at Taylor, eyes sliding from Christian.
Christian & Taylor
"Cool."
"Please don't kill us," Taylor begged softly, voice almost as tearful as his eyes as he looked up at the doctor.
"Please. I don't want to die."
Blakesley
"Immortality is a fool's quest," Blakesley said.
"Not even gods live forever. Come now, don't you want your death to have some form of meaning?"
Taylor
"I do want to die, but not yet," Taylor shook his head, eyes closing again.
"Please..."
"Could this get any more pitiful?" Christian's eyes went to the roof.
Blakesley
"Uncaring of your own likely demise?" Blakesley asked, before the intercom beeped.
The scientist walked over to it, picking up the handset.
"Blakesley here. What is it?"
Slowly, the usually calmly smiling face changed into one of near pure rage.
"What do you mean, you found her body, but you didn't find the three children? Incompetents! How do you know it is her? I have a screen here. I'll wait for your transmission. You better pray you are mistaken..."
Christian & Taylor
Christian just shrugged carelessly.
Taylor began to zone out, not quite hearing what anyone said. Christian watched him, sure he was about to faint again.
Blakesley
Blakesley went and uncovered the tv screen again, before it came on and showed a picture of a dead girl's body sprawled carelessly across a leafy path. She was wearing jeans, sneakers and a flannelette shirt, hair short and brown growing out into blonde. A dead dog was curled under her outflung arm.
"Turn her over," Blakesley said, watching the screen.
"The dog was alive when we approached, but one of the men killed it," a crackly radio distorted voice reported.
A hand came from off camera and turned the dead girl over. Her face was so badly beaten it was impossible to tell exactly what she might have looked like, but certain facil features made her appear similair to Mouse.
Christian
Christian held back a snort as Taylor did eventually faint.
He turned curious eyes to the screen and looked the girl over.
"Kind of looks like Jane. Is it her?" he raised his eyebrows.
Blakesley
"If it is, Human Resources may find they have several new subjects to draw on," Blakesley said testily.
"Check her body for tattoos. She has Eye of Horus depicted on her right arm, on the inside of her elbow, the pictograms for Rat and Mouse in Mandarin Chinese on her right ankle, opposing sides, Celtic bracelets on both her wrists in a blue ink..."
Blakesley listed the extensive tattoo work on Mouse's body as one of the soldiers knelt, flicking a knife out. A slit up the inside of the dead girl's top revealed a tattoo over her stomach, but not the cat it should have been. A butterfly rather. Subsequent checking revealed no more of the distinguishing marks that should have been on Mouse's body.
"Well, that was a waste of time and resources," Blakesley spat.
Christian & Taylor
Christian rolled his eyes and looked away.
Taylor soon came to again. The only way they could tell was his eyes fluttering open, before he finally lifted his head again looking tired.
Blakesley
Blakesley tidied away the screen, frowning.
"Too many disruptions..."
He checked his watch, remembering a meeting he had to attend that day.
Christian & Taylor
"Diddums," Christian muttered, hitting his head back against the wall again.
Taylor gulped slightly as he remembered what he'd seen before he fainted.
Blakesley
Blakesly tified up the room slightly, returning the knife he had used to storage before he left.
"I will be in to see you tomorrow, most like..."
Christian
"Miss you already," Christian smirked to himself as the doctor left.